In went Geraldine, imploring to wait for Wilmet, but all in vain; off went the chair, owner and escort alike in haste, and she was swept along, with Lance and Will with a hand holding either side of the chair, imparting breathless scraps of information, and exchanging remarks: 'There goes the Archdeacon.' 'The Thorpe choir is not come, and Miles is mad about it.' 'That's the Town Hall.' 'There's where Jack licked a cad for bullying.' 'There's a cannon-ball of Oliver Cromwell's sticking out of that wall.' 'That's the only shop fit to get gingerbeer at!' 'That old horse in that cab was in the Crimea.' 'We come last in the procession, and if you see a fellow like a sheep in spectacles, that's Shapcote.' 'Hurrah! what a stunning lot! where is it from?' 'Bembury? My eyes, if that big fellow doesn't mean to bawl us all down. Down that way-that's the palace. Whose carriage is it stopping there! Now, here's the Close.'
'Is that the Cathedral? Oh!'
'You may well say so! No, not that way.' And on rattled poor amazed Geraldine through an archway, under some lime trees, round a corner, round another comer, to another arched doorway, with big doors studded with nails, with a little door for use cut out of one of the big ones.
'You must get out here,' said Lance, 'we are close by,' and he helped her out, and paid and thanked the man with the chair. 'Here's our domain,' he continued, as he introduced Cherry through the open doorway into a small flagged court, with two houses, gray and old- fashioned, forming one side, and on the other an equally old long low building with narrow latticed arched windows. Opposite to the entrance was a handsome buttressed Gothic-looking edifice, behind which rose the gable of the north transept of the Cathedral, beautiful with a rose window, and farther back, far, far above, the noble tower.
Already everything was very wonderful to Geraldine. 'That's our kennel,' said Lance, pointing to the low buildings to the right. 'School's behind; but we boarders are put up in one of the old monks' dormitories, between court and cloister.'
'Is it really!' exclaimed Geraldine.
'So my father says,' said Will. 'Here's our door.' Another stone- arched passage, almost dark, with doors opening on either side, seemed common to both houses; and Will was inviting them to enter, but Lance held back. 'No time,' he said; 'better call your father.'
'The others,' sighed Geraldine.
'Bother the others! That's right: here he is!'
'Halloo, Father!' cried Will; 'we've got Cherry.'
'By which unceremonious designation I imagine you to mean to introduce Miss Underwood,' said a figure, appearing from beneath the archway, in trencher cap, surplice, and hood, with white hair, and a sort of precision and blandness that did not at all agree with Cherry's preconceived notions of the Harewood household. 'I am very glad to see you. My ladies, as usual, are unready. Will you have a glass of wine? No?-What do you say, Lancelot?-Very well, we will take you in at once. You will not object to waiting there, and this is the quiet time. -Boys, you ought to be with the choir.'
'Oceans of time, Dad,' coolly answered Will; 'none of the fellows up there are under weigh.'
Mr. Harewood offered his arm, but perceived that Cherry preferred Lance and her crutch; advancing to the door opposite that by which they had entered, he unlocked it, and Geraldine found herself passing through a beauteous old lofty chamber, with a groined Tudor roof, all fans, and pendants, and shields; tall windows stained with armorial bearings, parchment charters and blazoned genealogies against the walls, and screens upon screens loaded with tomes of all ages, writing-tables and chairs here and there, and glass-topped tables containing illuminations and seals. 'Here is my paradise,' said the librarian, smiling.
'I think it must be,' said Geraldine, with a long breath of wonder and admiration.
'Ah! would you not like to have a good look, Cherry?' said Lance. 'That's Richard Coeur de Lion's seal in there.'
'Don't begin about it-don't set him on,' whispered Willie, with a sign of his head towards his father, who was fitting the key into the opposite door, 'or we shall all stay here for the rest of the day.'
This low door open, Mr. Harewood and the boys bared their heads as they entered, and Geraldine felt the strange solemn sensation of finding herself in a building of vast height and majesty, full of a wonderful stillness, as though the confusion of sounds she had been in so recently were far, far off.
'Where now, Lancelot?' asked Mr. Harewood, in a hushed voice; 'do you want me any further?'
'No, thank you, sir, I'll just take her across the choir to Mr. Miles, and then join the rest of us at the vestry.'
'Good-bye for the present, then,' said Mr. Harewood kindly. 'You are in safe hands. Your brother comes round every one. I could not do this.'
Through the side-screen, into the grandly beautiful choir, arching high above, with stall-work and graceful canopies below, and rich glass casting down beams of coloured light-all for 'glory and for beauty,' thought Geraldine.
'You must not stop; you must look when you are settled. That's my side,' pointing to one of the choristers' desks. 'It will be only we that sing in here; the congregation is in the nave-a perfect sea of chairs. I'll come for you when it is over. Here is Mr. Miles. My sister, sir.'
A pale gentleman in spectacles, with a surplice and beautiful blue hood, was here addressed. He too greeted Geraldine, very shyly but kindly, and she found herself expected to ascend some alarming- looking stone steps. The organ was on the choir screen, and to the organist's little private gallery was she to ascend. It was a difficult matter, and she had in her trepidation despairingly recognised the difference between Lance's good will and Felix's practised strength; but at last she was landed in an admirable little cushioned nook, hidden by two tall painted carved canopies-exactly over the Dean's head, her brother told her-and where, as she sat sideways, she could see through the quatrefoils into the choir on the right hand, and the nave on the left. 'Delightful! Oh, thank you, how kind! If I am only not keeping any one out.'
'No,' said Lance, smiling, and whispering lower than ever, 'he has no one belonging to him. He hates women. Never a petticoat was here before in his reign. Have you a book?'
'They are robing, Underwood,' said the misogynist in the organ-loft; and Lance hurried away, leaving Geraldine alone, palpitating a good deal, but almost enjoying the solitude, in the vast structure, where the sanctity of a thousand years of worship seemed to fill the very air, as she gazed at the white vaultings and bosses carved with emblems above, at the vista of clustered columns terminating in the great jewelled west window, or at the crown-like loveliness that encompassed the sanctuary. All was still, except a deep low tone of the organ now and then. Mr. Miles looked in after the first, to hope she did not feel it uncomfortably, and to assure her that though she was too near his organ, she need not fear its putting forth its full powers; it was to be kept in subordination, and only guide the voices. This was great attention from a woman-hater, and Geraldine ventured to reiterate her thanks; at which he smiled, and said, 'When one has such a boy as your brother, there is pleasure in doing anything he wishes. You are musical?'
'I never was able to learn to play.'
'But you can read music?'
'Oh yes,' for she had often copied it.
So he brought her whole sheets of music, and put her in the way of following and understanding, perceiving, as he went, that she was full of intelligence and perception.
When he went back to his post, a few groups, looking very small, were creeping in by transept doors-by favour, like herself: then a little white figure flitted across to the desks, opened and marked the books, took up something, and disappeared; and in another moment Lance, in his broad white folds, was at her side. 'Here's the music. Oh, you have it! I've seen Fee,' he whispered; 'they are at Mrs. Harewood's, all right!' and he was gone.